Multiple+Intelligences

**What Is Multiple Intelligence?**
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When Howard Gardner's book, //Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences// (Basic Books, 1983) burst on the scene, it seemed to answer many questions for experienced teachers. They all had students who didn't fit the mold; students were bright, but they didn't excel during tests. Gardner's claim that there are several different kinds of intelligence gave us and others involved with teaching and learning a way of beginning to understand those students. We would look at what they could do well, instead of what they could not do.

According to Howard Gardner, schools must focus most of their attention of the linguistic and mathematical-logical intelligences, as society holds these people who are good in linguistics orlogicin high esteem. However, he also says that schools should also place equal attention on individuals who show gifts in the other intelligences: the artists, architects, musicians, naturalists, designers, dancers, therapists, entrepreneurs, and others who make up our multi-coloured cultures. Unfortunately, many children who have these gifts don’t receive much reinforcement for them in school, due to the lack of emphasis on such subjects. Many of these kids, in fact, end up being labeled "learning disabled," when their thinking methods and learning are not in line with a logical-mathematical or linguistic classroom. The theory of multiple intelligences proposes a major transformation in the way our schools are run. The theory of multiple intelligences also has strong implications for adult learning and development. Many adults find themselves in jobs that do not make optimal use of their most highly developed intelligences, for example a person who is highly kinesthetic stuck in a desk-bound job. The theory of multiple intelligences gives adults a whole new way to look at themselves, examining potentials that they find themselves to have or having the potential to further develop a different aspect of their lives.

VISUAL/SPATIAL - children who learn best visually and organizing things spatially. They like to see what you are talking about in order to understand. They enjoy charts, graphs, maps, tables, illustrations, art, puzzles, costumes - anything eye catching. • VERBAL/LINGUISTIC - children who demonstrate strength in the language arts: speaking, writing, reading, listening. These students have always been successful in traditional classrooms because their intelligence lends itself to traditional teaching. • MATHEMATICAL/LOGICAL - children who display an aptitude for numbers, reasoning and problem solving. This is the other half of the children who typically do well in traditional classrooms where teaching is logically sequenced and students are asked to conform. • BODILY/KINESTHETIC - children who experience learning best through activity: games, movement, hands-on tasks, building. These children were often labeled "overly active" in traditional classrooms where they were told to sit and be still! • MUSICAL/RHYTHMIC - children who learn well through songs, patterns, rhythms, instruments and musical expression. It is easy to overlook children with this intelligence in traditional education. • INTRAPERSONAL - children who are especially in touch with their own feelings, values and ideas. They may tend to be more reserved, but they are actually quite intuitive about what they learn and how it relates to themselves. • INTERPERSONAL - children who are noticeably people oriented and outgoing, and do their learning cooperatively in groups or with a partner. These children may have typically been identified as "talkative" or " too concerned about being social" in a traditional setting. • EXISTENTIALIST - children who learn in the context of where humankind stands in the "big picture" of existence. They ask "Why are we here?" and "What is our role in the world?" This intelligence is seen in the discipline of philosophy.
 * Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences**

Later on, Howard Gardner added on an eighth facet of intelligence, the "naturalist" intelligence:

NATURALIST - children who love the outdoors, animals, field trips. More than this, though, these students love to pick up on subtle differences in meanings. The traditional classroom has not been accommodating to these children.

-http://ehlt.flinders.edu.au/education/DLiT/2004/13DLT/MultIntell.htm

Multiple Intelligence table

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 * // Charles Low wrote:

View the video below to see/hear experts' critique of Gardner's 'Multiple Intelligences' theory:
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